Joy in five unexpected places

Trying to find some joy during quarantine has been hard for me. I’m finding it helpful to turn my attention to things that make my heart happy when I feel overwhelmed by world events, which my obsession and worry will not change at all. Here are five random things that made me happy from the last day or so.

Color

I find that several times a day I am just staring at certain color combinations and drinking them in. It feels like they are changing my body chemistry in some good way.

Chickens

I’ve been getting eggs from the farm stand, along with gorgeous produce. Since they come wrapped in newspaper we keep them in a white ceramic bowl in the fridge and it makes me happy every time I open the fridge door.

A gang of the neighbor’s chickens have started hanging out in Lower Field and gather to watch John work and to wait for him to leave so they can swoop in to look for bugs and seeds. Lola has three chicken kills notched into her collar from far in her past so we are hoping that the field is a bit too far for her to wander to on her own. (If you look closely below you will see the gang.)

In addition to visiting they start crowing at around 3am these days but as just the right distance away to be somehow amusing if I happen to be awake but never wake me. Here’s the recording of a couple of them I did about a year ago when I was fascinated that adolescent roosters had a higher pitcher crow. 

And of course there’s nothing wrong with a nice roasted chicken.

Poppies and wheat.

And just wheat.

All from the daily walks that keep me sane.

Getting back to essentials

It hasn’t prompted a full-on Kondo but since lockdown began I seem to get a deep sense of satisfaction slowly going through things and throwing out what I don’t need or want. Oddly enough this has also touched my online life where I’ve been getting rid of loads of unneeded apps and gone deep into cleaning up bookkeeping. It feels good and like one part of life I can control.